Hello, As part of my modeling research, one of the things which puzzled me was the range of numbers for 60' boxcars in the 1960s. According to thsi website: B-70-1 was numbered 960400-960471 http://freight.railfan.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=up960462&o=up A-90-6 was numbered 960098-960622. http://freight.railfan.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=up960608&o=up Another discovery was this class of B-70-2 cars built the same year. http://www.boxcars.us/Boxcars_M_Z/U-UP/pages/image117.html Does anyone know the number range for the B-70-2 cars? Plus, how accurate are the numbers for the previous two classes? I would be very glad to know.
I wish I could give a definitive answer, but someone with a freight/passenger car guide should be able to help. These smaller high-cube cars (along with 40 and 50' variants) carried the heavy components for auto manufacturing such as engines, transmissions and axles. The lighter items were loaded into the enormous 86' boxcars (sheet metal stampings, interiors, etc). Many of these cars were pool-specific. For example, Ford and Chrysler required 4-door cars, while GM preferred 8-door cars. Many cars owned by a road often spent most of their service lives off of home rails, too. Auto parts were extremely time-sensitive shipments, so dispatchers were encouranged to keep them moving at track speed.
